Who Lost The End of Mark's Gospel?

by cofty 16 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  cofty

  This is a question for those who still hold a supernatural view of the bible.

  It would seem to be certain that the gospel of Mark was the first to be written, and that Matthew and Luke copied large parts of Mark when compiling their gospels.

  From a theological perspective the most important event in the story - the heart of the gospel or "good news" is the resurrection of Jesus. It was this event and its implications that the disciples proclaimed.

  The way that Mark reports the resurrection is puzzling.

  When the Sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go to anoint Jesus’ body. 2 Very early on the first day of the week, just after sunrise, they were on their way to the tomb 3 and they asked each other, “Who will roll the stone away from the entrance of the tomb?”

  4 But when they looked up, they saw that the stone, which was very large, had been rolled away. 5 As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side, and they were alarmed.

  6 “Don’t be alarmed,” he said. “You are looking for Jesus the Nazarene, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they laid him. 7 But go, tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.’”

  8 Trembling and bewildered, the women went out and fled from the tomb. They said nothing to anyone, because they were afraid.

  The verses that follow in many modern bibles are certainly not original. The oldest manuscripts finish with this strange cliff-hanger. The only witnesses to empty tomb tell nobody about what they have seen and heard.

  The answer would seem to be that the remainder of Mark's gospel has simply got lost. If Mark's gospel was writen in a codex format it is likely that the last page was lost or damaged before it was copied.

  Does it not seem strange that if the bible was inspired of god that the most important part of the earliest gospel was not preserved?

  Why did this not worry me when I was a JW or later as a christian?
• 

  mP

  Cofty:

  The divinity of Jesus was an after thought invented many years after the original story of a man who told the Jews to stop fighting and be obedient slaves of the Romans came along. I find it particularly interesting that Matthew a supposed apostle ends up copying Mark word for word for about two thirds of his own gospel ? How does one explain one witness copying someone who wasnt there to give his own eye witness account ?
• 

  Band on the Run

  I have no clue. It is not news to me. If I recall correctly, the source that the evangelists were thought to use, Q, had no passion narrative. So Mark has more than Q.

  The gospels are not biographies. I wonder what the earliest Christians believed. If their definite beliefs were so important, Jesus would have dictated creeds. It should give fundies pause - but it won't.

  When I was a Witness, I never noticed the differences in the gospel accounts. Do the Witnesses believe the church was still pure at canonization b/c they accept the canon? We never studied the Bible. Only the WT lit. Jumping all over the Bible, how would we notice differences or even similarities.

  Last Lent, my priest went through the various differences. I can't help myself. My upbringing was traditional. It seeped in despite the Witnesses. Cecil B/ DeMille, Radio City Music Hall, and later Zeferelli. I asked how he could separate them even with his training. He confessed he could not. He had flow charts and notes all over the place.

  One resurrection story that still scares me is when he tells Magdalene not to touch him. I want him to be human or God. This transitional stuff upsets me.
• 

  cofty

  How does one explain one witness copying someone who wasnt there to give his own eye witness account ? - mP

  This fact alone proves they are not eyewitness accounts. Even when Matthew tells the account of the calling of Matthew he copies Mark. (Compare Mark 2:13-17 and Matthew 9:9-13)

  If I was writing about something that happened to me I certainly wouldn't copy the words of a third party, I would write what I knew firsthand.

  When I was a Witness, I never noticed the differences in the gospel accounts. - BOTR

  None of us did. Neither do most christians. That is why Bart Erhman advises people to read the gospels "horizontally". In other words read the birth narratives in all the gospels and then read the baptism stories and so on. You will be amazed. The first thing you will notice is that the earliest gospel didn't think Jesus' miraculous conception worth mentioning.
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  transhuman68

  The theory I like is that Mark was written on a scroll, and both ends of the scroll were damaged somehow, as there are two versions of the first verse as well, and the beginning is grammatically 'awkward' as if it was written by someone else. I read a theory that most of Mark chapter 13, although it is written as Jesus words, is actually a Jewish apocalyptic tract that was circulating at the time and was just copied word for word into Mark.
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  Berengaria

  I see Jesus as a Ghandi, John Lennon, Martin Luther King Jr. figure. I'm sure there are many many more through every age, that I have forgotten.

  Good men all who tried to make people think about what really matters.
• 

  mP

  Transhuman68

  The theory I like is that Mark was written on a scroll, and both ends of the scroll were damaged somehow, as there are two versions of the first verse as well, and the beginning is grammatically 'awkward' as if it was written by someone else. I read a theory that most of Mark chapter 13, although it is written as Jesus words, is actually a Jewish apocalyptic tract that was circulating at the time and was just copied word for word into Mark.

  MP

  Whie that appears to be an elegant solution, it doesnt explain how nobody noticed. Are we to believe there was one copy and it got its edges burnt ? If Peter really went to Rome and there were thousands of followers, shouldnt there have been literally many many thousands of copies befor ethe disciples died ? How does one explain they didnt keep a definitive copy or the original just like the Americans did with the declaration of indy etc. Are we to believe the mere founding fathers were smarter than the god assisted apostles ?

  Berengaria

  I see Jesus as a Ghandi, John Lennon, Martin Luther King Jr. figure. I'm sure there are many many more through every age, that I have forgotten.

  Good men all who tried to make people think about what really matters.

  MP

  Jesus was not good, he was a racist, sexist jewish man of the times. He was a pawn who told the jews not to fight but to be happy with their destiny as slaves of the romans.
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  transhuman68

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Mark

  Read it and weep....
• 

  Leolaia

  There is a recent book on this called the Mutilation of the Gospel of Mark. It points out that the end is not the only thing missing -- the original beginning is lost too. It starts with the title of the work (which is extremely variable in the manuscript tradition) and what follows starts in mid-sentence in the same way that the book ends in mid-sentence. The author theorizes that Mark was originally written not on a scroll but on a codex and before the original manuscript was copied, the outer leaf had detached and became lost. This had happened sometime in the first century AD because if we look at Matthew and Luke, their narratives are widely divergent basically until they reach where Mark's narrative begins and they closely follow Mark sometimes almost verbatim until the point at which Mark's narrative ends, at which point they again diverge dramatically.

  There is still a further question of whether Mark was elsewhere truncated or expanded, and the particular question of "Longer Mark" or "Secret Mark" is still extremely controversial in scholarship owing to uncertainty over the authenticity of the manuscript evidence (including suspicions of a hoax). But there are oddities in the present text of Mark, such as the following passage where it looks like something is missing: "Now they came to Jericho. Ø As he went out of Jericho with his disciples and a great multitude..." (10:46).

  With respect to the Longer Ending, one manuscript attributes its authorship to Aristion, who was the presbyter Papias mentions as one of his primary sources -- indicating a date in the first half of the second century AD. The Longer Ending is also dependent on the other synoptic gospels as well as John, and it seems to have a docetic background (v. 12).
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  cofty

  Thanks Leo. The missing section in Mark 10 is very interesting, I never noticed that before.

  I have never heard anybody explain how the bible can be inspired if god allowed one of its most important passages - the resurrection narrative - to be lost forever within a few years of it being written.